FEATURE:
Don't Be Told About What You Want
Sex Pistols’ God Save the Queen at Forty-Five
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THERE is a sense of symmetry and history…
PHOTO CREDIT: London Features
with the Sex Pistols’ anthem, God Save the Queen. One of the most iconic and important Punk songs ever written, it was the second single from the band’s only studio album, Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols. The song was released during Queen Elizabeth II's Silver Jubilee in 1977. On 27th May, it will be forty-five years since this incredible track was released. I am not anti-royalist, so I cannot abide by all of the sentiment and intention behind the song. Reaching number 1 in the NME chart here; it reached two on the official chart. There was debate as to whether the BBC – who felt God Save the Queen was too controversial – fixed things so that the song could not get to the top of the charts. Before getting to an article exploring why God Save the Queen was so provocative, the band’s official website discusses a song that challenged the idea of place of royalty in the United Kingdom:
"John Rotten’s alternative National Anthem. The Sex Pistols second 7″ single, and their first for Virgin Records, released on May 27th 1977. Sid Vicious had replaced Glen Matlock on bass prior to recording but does not play on the final track.
Despite popular belief, release of ‘GSTQ’ was not pre-planned to coincide with the Queen’s Silver Jubilee celebrations in June. Originally titled ‘No Future’ the track was written in 1976 and would actually have been released in March 1977 had A&M Records not sacked the Pistols after only 10 days. Some advance copies of the A&M single were pressed and are now worth a small fortune.
There are not many songs – written over baked beans at the breakfast table – that went onto divide a nation and force a change in popular culture. No one had ever dared question the Monarchy so publicly; and it wasn’t without its repercussions. Members of the band were attacked in the streets; and Government Members of Parliament even called for the Pistols to be hung at London’s Traitors’ Gate!
Even though it was banned from radio and TV – and the Pistols were branded public enemy #1 – ‘GSTQ’ stormed to the top of the charts. It technically out-sold the Number 1 record of the week (The First Cut is the Deepest by Rod Stewart) but peaked at Number 2. The powers-that-be refused to acknowledge it but the Sex Pistols were Number 1. This wasn’t a conspiracy theory, this was for real”.
On 31st May, 1977, the BBC banned God Save the Queen. As this article explores, the backlash and negative press the Sex Pistols’ single garnered was just what helped them to become so popular. It is a song that still resonates and sounds groundbreaking to this day:
“Thirty years after its release, John Lydon—better known as Johnny Rotten—offered this assessment of the song that made the Sex Pistols the most reviled and revered figures in England in the spring of 1977: “There are not many songs written over baked beans at the breakfast table that went on to divide a nation and force a change in popular culture.” Timed with typical Sex Pistols flair to coincide with Queen Elizabeth II’s Silver Jubilee, the release of “God Save The Queen” was greeted by precisely the torrent of negative press that Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren had hoped. On May 31, 1977, the song earned a total ban on radio airplay from the BBC—a kiss of death for a normal pop single, but a powerful endorsement for an anti-establishment rant like “God Save The Queen.”
While some in the tabloid press accused the Sex Pistols of treason and called for their public hanging, the BBC was more moderate in its condemnation. In response to lyrics like “God Save The Queen/She ain’t no human being,” the BBC labeled the record an example of “gross bad taste”—a difficult charge to argue, and one the Sex Pistols wouldn’t have wanted to dispute. Even with the radio ban in place, however, and with major retailers like Woolworth refusing to sell the controversial single, “God Save The Queen” flew off the shelves of the stores that did carry it, selling up to 150,000 copies a day in late May and early June. With sales figures like that, it seems implausible that “God Save The Queen” really stalled at #2 on the official UK pop charts, yet that is where it appeared, as a blank entry below “I Don’t Want to Talk About It” by Rod Stewart, the ultimate anti-punk. Like every other effort to suppress the song, refusing even to print its name in the official pop charts played right into the Sex Pistols’ hands”.
Before closing up a feature marking forty-five years of God Save the Queen kicking down doors and changing culture, The Guardian explain how the song is, appropriately, being reissued to coincide with the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee:
“Sex Pistols’ God Save the Queen, arguably the most iconic single in punk rock history, is to be reissued to mark Elizabeth II’s upcoming platinum jubilee.
The band’s second single after Anarchy in the UK, it was released in 1977 alongside the Queen’s silver jubilee with a decidedly anti-royalist bent, comparing the monarchy to a “fascist regime … She ain’t no human being / and there’s no future / and England’s dreaming”.
Despite being banned from BBC radio and television, the song reached No 2 – held off the top by Rod Stewart – though rumours have persisted ever since that the charts were manipulated to keep the song away from the No 1 spot. In its listing on the charts, it was blanked out so as not to offend the Queen.
Now, the song has another chance to reach the top, as thousands of physical copies are repressed for release on 27 May. Four thousand copies of the version released on Virgin Records will be released, with Did You No Wrong on the B-side. Another 1,977 copies of the single’s original version on A&M Records will also be released, with its own original B-side, No Feeling.
The original A&M version is one of the most sought-after releases in rock history. The band had signed to the label in a ceremony outside Buckingham Palace in March 1977, but after a couple of incidents – including a friend of A&M’s director being threatened by a hanger-on of the band – they were dropped six days later, and nearly all of the 25,000 pressed copies of God Save the Queen were destroyed. Copies of the A&M version have since been sold for up to $22,155 (£17,700).
Pistols drummer Paul Cook later said that God Save the Queen wasn’t written to mark the silver jubilee: “We weren’t aware of it at the time. It wasn’t a contrived effort to go out and shock everyone.” Originally titled No Future, it had been performed on tour in 1976.
Nevertheless, under the aegis of manager Malcolm McLaren, the band renamed it God Save the Queen, and embraced the potential for provocation. They performed a concert on the jubilee itself on a boat called the Queen Elizabeth, sailing on the Thames – various members of the boat party were swiftly arrested when they docked.
Lyricist John Lydon, AKA Johnny Rotten, later brushed off the idea that it was a sustained, angry attack on the monarchy. “God Save the Queen – it’s kinda camp in a way. You certainly don’t think it’s gonna be taken as a declaration of civil war,” he said. But the band members were subjected to physical attacks by offended listeners in the wake of the song’s release, including with razor blades and iron bars”.
A song that shook the establishment and gained so much press when it was released in May 1977, the forty-fifth anniversary of God Save the Queen on 27th May will see new angles and thoughts written. Maybe John Lydon has mellowed regarding his position on the Queen and royalty…but it will be great to hear what he has to say when God Save the Queen turns forty-five. A terrific and hugely important song and a adored monarch…
LONG may they both reign!